July 2, 2008.

Today we were continuing north and going through the Great Dismal Swamp. There was a scheduled bridge opening in Elizabeth City at 0730 that we needed to make in order to make it to the first lock on the Dismal Swamp on time. The bridge is directly adjacent to the free slips in town so we backed out of our slip at 0715 and waited patiently.

We established communication with the bridge tender and he raised the bridge, well, most of it. When the bridge started going up only one span worked. We called him and asked if that’s all we were getting and he tersely replied that one span was not working. Okay, fine but he could have mentioned that 2 minutes ago when we were talking to him.

After the bridge the river is a winding, but very beautiful trip. After 18 miles we arrived at the first lock of the Dismal Swamp. We’ve decided that we are the very last cruising boat headed north and as such we locked through alone.
The lock raised us up 8 feet and released us into the swamp.

The Dismal Swamp is very beautiful but very boring at the same time. We had fairly thick smoke from nearby forest fires drifting through the trees which created an eerie effect. We had to take turns steering as driving was mentally exhausting and demanded constant attention. You had to stand at the helm and dodge one stump or log after another. The last time we came through here we decided that it would be our last because of the amount of debris that we “tried” to dodge in the water.
But alas, we are back again. Besides the smoke we had another first for us while in the swamp…..

Flies. An unbelievable amount of flies. We had to light bug torches, spray ourselves with repellent and wield fly swatters the entire time. If you weren’t driving, you were swatting. We were actually thankful for the smoky sections as it cut down on the flies.

After dropping back down 11 feet at the second lock we decided to anchor right in front of the lock. The locks only open 4 times a day and since we made the last opening for today, there would be no more traffic for the evening and we can stay right here until 0800 tomorrow. It’s a great spot with a tiny park for the dogs and some sketchy wifi for us.

The next morning we were up early and underway at 0800. There are several bridges in the next 10 miles and most are closed until rush hour is over so there’s no hurry. Of course, the first bridge that we came to was a railroad bridge. The rail road bridges are usually left open and only close when a train is coming or for MAINTENANCE, Shit.

We arrived at 0830 to hear a tugboat complaining that he’d been sitting there since 0630. Finally the bridge was repaired and we were through at 0930. We had been planning a short 20 mile day today but once we were through the bridges we were making excellent time as we were sucked out of Norfolk by the outgoing tide. We entered the Chesapeake doing 8 1/2 knots. Of course, when we turned north it started to work against us but only for a short while.










Once the current turned in our favor we were able to make it to Jackson Creek, Va. The anchorage here is very protected but has a ridiculously deceptive entrance. You literally have to drive the boat right up to the beach before making a hairpin turn back into the entrance. Very scary stuff.